by Caroline Kramer

Created on: December 22, 2008

In 2006 India passed landmark legislation to protect women from an epidemic of domestic violence in the country. The statistics were sobering. There was a domestic crime against a woman every three minutes, a rape every 29 minutes and a dowry related death every 77 minutes (source National Crime Records Bureau). The legislation sought to protect the 70% of married women thought to be affected by everything from beatings to murder for their dowry, the money they brought with them into the marriage.

In November 2008 Delhi recorded its highest ever number of registered domestic abuse cases. In some ways this is disheartening but might actually signal the advent of a new age where women are reporting abuse rather than just accepting it as a normal part of married life. There is still a problem for women who report and that is that out of 28 states and 7 territories only 13 have allocated budgets for implementation of the legislative process and some of these are inadequate. Therefore, whilst the benchmark for resolution of a domestic violence case is less than three months, many women are waiting more than six with the obvious repercussions of disrupted living, continuing abuse and difficulty with child custody surrounding them.
But another, perhaps more insidious, problem has arisen from the increased awareness of domestic abuse and that is abuse of the system by women themselves. This has two problems, primarily that there are a group of men who find themselves jailed and deprived of their status by misuse of the dowry laws and secondly, and perhaps more subtly, those very dowry laws, designed to protect women in the worst of situations and give them immediate relief from abuse, are no in the process of revision and will require more proof and therefore a longer time frame for implementation. This will do a dis-service to those already most in danger through lack of education or poor living situations who rely on a "quick release system" for safety but it will protect innocent men from attack from angry spouses eager for revenge.
There is hope for the future. On-line campaigns like Bell Bajao seek to educate the next generation in acceptable behavior. It both brings to light the problem and seeks to encourage communities to hold offenders to task. Using modern media, including Internet, it aims to embrace across society and challenge established norms.
Another interesting ruling came from Delhi in 2007 when it was announced that the domestic violence legislation could be applied for cases which happened in the past. This surprising ruling left little hiding place for persistent offenders who thought to modify their behavior in the hope of avoiding prosecution.
All in all it will be a long road for India to re-educate both men and women away from domestic violence. Equitable legislation that quickly protects victims and also the rights of the accused is hard to craft in any society, but even more in one where so many women are beginning to realize that they are victims. Domestic violence has only been recognized in India for twenty-five years, not long enough to change an ancient society but too long for those who still wait silently in their houses.

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